Is the IT market in Poland open to people with disabilities (PWDs)?

• The ICT sector is one of the best developing employee markets in the entire EU. According to Eurostat, within less than a decade (2011–2019), the number of specialists in this area increased by 40%, and it is expected to continue growing. In Poland a four-fold increase was recorded for the analogous period.
• This sector has enough space for a wide range of competencies. Not only does it gather IT specialists and developers, but also product owners, testers, data scientists, UX/UI designers, and people from related branches, i.e. engineers, mathematicians, physicists, specialists in statistics and materials science, as well as psychologists and other people with soft skills. This branch is promising, and offers great possibilities for personal and financial development. Unlike any other sector, IT is open for remote work. What is more, the Western market also gives Polish developers huge opportunities: [https://stepwise.pl/why-is-it-worth-choosing-it-outsourcing-in-poland/]
• At the same time, there are over 4.5 million people with disabilities (PWDs) in Poland, of which only 28.8% of those of working age are employed (data from the website of the Office of the Government Plenipotentiary for Disabled People, www.niepełnosprawni.gov.pl).
• A report by the Polish Central Statistical Office (GUS) on the economic activity of the Polish population shows that the total number of professionally inactive people in Poland is 13 million. In this context, disability is indicated as the second cause of inactivity.

Disabled software developers in Poland — are they Yetis?

In February 2020, StackOverflow investigated the global world of software developers. Out of 20,000 people doing this work, 1284 (6.4%) confirmed they had a disability. Of them, 1.1% were visually impaired or blind, 0.7% were deaf/had a hearing impairment, and 0.3% had a physical disability. Even if the StackOverflow survey concerned just Polish software developers, disabled developers were not as common in their domestic branch.

Stepwise is a a software house all prepared for employing persons with disabilities. “I’d like to employ disabled people, regardless of the financial support from the Polish State Fund for Rehabilitation of Disabled People (PFRON). I just wish to have a diverse team and a varied attitude towards work, and simply to support disabled people by offering them good working conditions. But I’ve noticed that people with disabilities (PWDs) don’t respond to our job offers and I wonder why?” says Krzysztof Stepwise, CEO at Stepwise.

Maybe those with disabilities (PWDs) who work as developers do not reveal themselves or — which seems more probable — there is a relatively small number of PWDs in this profession. Why is it so?

Experts dealing with career counselling and the labour market for disabled people point out a few key reasons that are associated with the low activity of PWDs in the labour market.

“First of all, generally, the support system for PWDs is in many respects inefficient and doesn’t work well”, explains Łukasz Bednarski, a career counsellor at Fundacja Integracja (Integration Foundation). “In most EU countries, 50% of disabled people are professionally active, and in Poland it’s just 30%. In the old EU countries, system support for persons with disabilities is at a significantly higher level, e.g. they have access to nursing services, receive help with travelling to work etc. In Poland this is much more difficult.”

The education of PWDs is also a problem. Even if disabled people finish studies, they usually become psychologists and pedagogues. “The reason is simple: they study to first help themselves”, says Bednarski. In his opinion, multitudes of persons with disabilities suffer from infantile cerebral palsy that causes dyscalculia, i.e. a condition that affects the ability to acquire arithmetical skills, which partially explains the small number of disabled people with science degrees.

According to Marcin Piechota, who deals with recruiting PWDs and providing support for those companies that want to employ them, the system of financing training sessions by PFRON is inefficient. He points out that as part of the “Aktywny Samorząd” (Active Self-Government) programme, through self-governments, PFRON co-finances studies, but the maximum amount is PLN 4000 per semester. In the case of software development, the costs are considerably higher and many people are not able to overcome this barrier. “This is why training sessions are either non-market or they concern just the basic skills: MS Office operation, office works. PFRON simply doesn’t have the money for serious training sessions in software development”, thinks Piechota. Łukasz Bednarski from Fundacja Integracja also agrees with this opinion. “If we receive PLN 1000 from PFRON, then what can we offer?” “So, here we go with computer literacy and training sessions in entering data into databases or analysing information available in the Internet”, says Bednarski.

Anna Tomczyk, who also supports people with disabilities in finding a job, pays attention to another aspect. “The system in Poland is unfriendly. There’s something like a pension trap: people born with disabilities who receive the benefit from ZUS (the Social Insurance Institution) may not earn more than 70% of the average wage, i.e. PLN 3600 gross. If it does happen, the state takes away the disability pension of PLN 1200 gross. This discourages PWDs to change jobs frequently, since in the case of losing a better paid job, they have to re-activate their disability pension”, she adds.

In a Facebook discussion in a group for PWDs looking for jobs, one of the commentors paid attention to another aspect of this situation: “How many software developers with IT degrees are there among able-bodied employees in the Polish market? This is a relatively elite professional group”, she wrote.

Psyche, i.e. soul

Leszek Teszka from Fundacja IT (IT Foundation) in Szczecin notices one more problem. “We organised training courses in software development at a high level. We offered transport. And what was the problem? A lack of interest. It wasn’t easy to find participants. Of course there are isolated cases of people who took part in the training session, passed the examination and completed the apprenticeship at IT companies, which was part of our project. But they were a number of strongly determined persons that we can count on one hand”, he says. Why is that so? He pays attention to psychological issues. “I have the impression that they are mentally tough people. They sometimes don’t understand that they also must give something of themselves and be determined to achieve a given objective.”

Sylwia Błach, a software developer specialising in C#, Unity3D, and also CMS for creating WordPress websites, is undoubtedly an example of a determination and strong will. She works in a renowned IT company on a project using VOXBOX technology known from computer games (https://www.vox.pl/projekty-voxbox). Sylwia studied IT at the Poznań University of Technology. She gets around in a wheelchair. “During the first year of my studies I was crying all the time. It was sometimes really hard. But my parents brought me up with a feeling that yes, I use a wheelchair but my head and hands are ok”, she explains. In addition, she conducts training sessions in HTML and WordPress, writes books (futuristic thrillers), is a model, fashion influencer and social activist fighting for the rights of the disabled and women. “I’ve never perceived my life in the context of disability. I was always studying and it was natural that I would go to university and then to work”, she says. When asked how she finds time for all her activities, she replies that this is just a matter of planning.

“At Stepwise we look for such people: professional active team-players”, says Krzysztof Szukieć, CEO at Stepwise. “People with disabilities are welcome and it will be our pleasure to adapt their work areas, where necessary. In our internal survey, 100% of our people said that working with PWDs was a plus if they had technical competencies, were team leaders and showed commitment”, adds Szukieć.

Nevertheless, disabled people themselves agree that such attitudes are uncommon in their community. Why? A lot of people have low self-esteem, enhanced both by families and the surrounding world. PWDs should receive positive support early in their childhood, as exemplified not only by Sylwia Błach, but also Adrian Furman, CEO at Grupa AF (AF Group), who was born with a disability. He says he is not able to make tea and take the rubbish out. “But in the morning, when I’m waiting for the tea, I would use this time to give my orders to the employees”, he says. “If I were to use one word to describe what has defined me, I would say it’s the word ‘NO’. ‘NO’ was related to my origin as a disabled person, (…) ‘NO’ is related to the fact that by definition I’m weak. Nothing could be further from the truth”, he emphasises. Today he runs a company specialising in IT consulting. His idee fixe is showing the world the benefits of employing PWDs. His company employs 30 people, most of whom are disabled.

Mariusz, FE developer, is among them. “I’m a hearing impaired person, which — it may seem — would hinder communication. The IT sector very often uses instant messaging. Voice chats can be supported by written communication, which is very convenient”, he explains. He claims that employers’ good will and adapted work areas are sufficient, and those with disabilities can work on a par with able-bodied people. In his opinion, professional aspirations of PWDs are often repressed by unfavourable law and, looking more broadly, society. “A disabled person is not just the one who is not able to get up from a wheelchair, but they are also blind people who can be outstanding physiotherapists, people without arms who code equally fast (my friend is one example), people suffering from infantile cerebral palsy whose disability doesn’t rule out the possibility of holding a managerial position, and finally people getting around in a wheelchair — like our CEO, whose determination and striving for objectives could be compared to Steve Job’s aspirations. We stopped insulting red-haired people, and those wearing glasses, so it’s high time that society got rid of the stereotypes about PWDs. This is what clips our wings. And as far as our physical barriers are concerned, we can manage ourselves”, says Mariusz.

The attitude is important, which is exemplified by Anne Taylor, blind Director of Supportability in Microsoft’s Accessibility programme, who usually sees the glass half full, not empty. As a 7-year-old girl she told her parents in Thailand (she comes from there) that she would work in the United States.

The task for employers

Some disabled people think that the employers who show good will, are ready to adapt conditions that suit the needs of PWDs, are not guided by stereotypes, financial support is not their most important motivation, and do employ people with disabilities are uncommon. “In Poland people think in stereotypes — a disability means a lack of high qualifications”, thinks disabled Radosław Ignasiak. “My girlfriend, who is also a disabled person, speaks three foreign languages fluently and has a degree in philosophy, but has been looking for a job for years”, he says. In his opinion, this is the fault of stereotypes which are perpetuated by system institutions, e.g. day care centres for persons with disabilities. “Children are taught how to make plasticine figures instead of mathematics or logics. This will not produce us a generation with IT skills”, he adds. Anita Młyczyńska, who works as a recruiter of IT specialists, has similar observations. “Some employers focus mainly on the financial support from PFRON. They offer PWDs the lowest rates possible, which in many cases is below the level of their qualifications”, she claims. In her opinion, there are disabled people among the developers but they hide this fact to avoid discouraging employers from offering high rates.

Marek Tankielun, Manager of Typhlo Computer Scientific Laboratory at the Wrocław University of Science and Technology, mentions stereotyping among employers. He admits that, partly for this reason, he sometimes worked on projects whose investors had no idea he was blind. He just did not reveal this fact as he did not have to. He did not want his employers to perceive his work through the prism of his disability. “And my disability is my immanent feature, like hair colour”, says Tankielun.

“We employ people on the basis of their competencies: we evaluate their professionalism, attitude and commitment. If you are a team player, your technical skills will improve by working together with people, e.g. on a project. I don’t judge people by their hair colour during recruitment, and any disability won’t matter either”, says Krzysztof Szukieć, CEO at Stepwise.

To promote such attitudes among employers, initiatives are taken to build awareness of the benefits connected with employing persons with disabilities and — more broadly — people who somehow differ from one another, e.g. in religion, ethnic origin, skin colour or sexual orientation. Think-tank Diversity Hub and the SoDA Association conducted a survey on diversity management in business (Diversity&Inclusion). Out of 121 representatives of branch-specific companies, 47% of the respondents reported that diversity (including persons with disabilities in teams) was a significant value in business. Nevertheless, the majority of the respondents (85%) admitted that no steps were taken in the direction of D&I. 58% of the respondents answered positively when asked if in the nearest three years the significance of D&I management would increase. Similar results were observed in a survey by Vessy.com. When asked if D&I is important in organisations, 54.5% of the companies answered yes. But the answers regarding specific activities in this direction were not very convincing. 27.3% of the respondents gave positive answers to the question whether identification and implementation of such activities is urgent for companies. For the remaining respondents it did not matter. And it would not take much to show PWDs that employers are willing to employ them. Apart from the aspects related to physical accessibility to the office and adapting work areas, employers can state their willingness in their job offers.

Disabled people emphasise that employers also have to remember about adapting the space to their needs: e.g. a straight route from the lift to the desk, not blocked by equipment or unnecessary accessories, is important. There are some methods of marking rooms that can be read out by visually impaired people. Parking places and offices which can easily be reached by public transport are also important.

The benefits of employing PWDs

Marek Tankielun points out that apart from the financial support from PFRON (70% of salary, covering the costs of adapting work areas), there is a wide range of other benefits of employing disabled people. “First of all, it shapes openness in companies. But in the case of IT, those with disabilities can be much more beneficial. They can help increase the digital accessibility of products”, explains Tankielun. In his opinion, psychological research shows that having PWDs in teams changes the point of view of both interface designers and software architects. “This is because we have a slightly different vision that we don’t experience in the context of our work”, explains Tankielun. It is not accidental that the largest companies in this sector, i.e. Google and Microsoft, have had such teams adjusting their products to the needs of disabled people for years.

According to Marek Tankielun, if blind people have the proper tools, there is no difference in work compared to sighted developers. “I don’t see anything now. My work area looks a bit weird: there isn’t any screen or mouse on my desk; I only use the keyboard. I use screen reader software which tells me everything sighted people see on the screen. This allows me to use the Internet as well as other kinds of analytical and software development tools”, he explains.

These tools include e.g. free NVDA screen reading software programmed in Python. “This is important because if your new development environment doesn’t work well with it, e.g. Visual Studio Code, it’s possible to write extension in Python”, he says.

There would not be NVDA, if its developer, Michael Curran, had not lost his vision at the age of 15. Together with his blind friend, James Tech, they wondered why the then solutions for blind people were expensive and unavailable for many people. In 2006 they started writing the code. Currently NVDA is the second most popular screen reader in the world, and in many developing countries it is the first tool for blind people using computers. NVDA is supported by such companies as Adobe, Mozilla, Microsoft and Yahoo.

The histories of many other applications and solutions that help disabled people live, work and, where possible, live to the full show that they contributed to their creation. There are multitudes of such examples in the world. In Poland there is for instance the Parrot One application that uses Machine Learning. It was created by Piotr Lewandowski who suffers from Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease that affects the nervous system and leads among others to muscular atrophy. He can use just his two fingers. His application enables typing a simple sentence, e.g. “Hello, what’s up?” by touching the keyboard twice. The difference compared to other solutions available in the market is significant: SwiftKey requires 7 touches, and Go Keyboard — 11. It can be helpful not only for people with muscular atrophy, but for anyone, since it accelerates typing.

Another interesting example is the application by Michael Jonk, Paralympic marathon runner from Opole. In his engineer’s thesis in IT at the Opole University of Technology, he described an application for disabled people doing hand bike road racing. It facilitates working on your condition and calculating kilocalories burnt during workout. “I’m first and foremost an athlete, I do para hand bike road racing. I use a hand bike in a semi-lying position. There is a lower air resistance than in a standard bike. I hadn’t found any application in the market that would have included these aerodynamic aspects as well as other issues related to this discipline. This is why I created this application, and I’m still developing it”, explains Michael.

Nothing about us without us

According to the World Bank, disabled people make up 15% of the world’s population. Obviously, for business, this is a large group of consumers, recipients and users of various goods and services. In the world of IT and software development, the statement “nothing about us without us” works — people with disabilities can be beneficial for the software sector and contribute to its expansion, especially when according to the EU strategy for the next few years, the future of Europe is intended to be digital and beneficial for all the people.